Twin Terrors
by Sakon76
Summary: Landing a bit off course, Sunstreaker and Sideswipe have to lay low for a while in Japan.  The Hitachiin twins, meanwhile, would really like cars for their birthday... Not RotF or DotM compliant for Transformers.
1. Chapter 1

**Twin Terrors**  
>by K. Stonham<br>first released 16th September 2007

In all human social strata, there are certain rites, varying greatly from nation to nation and culture to culture, that are expected to be fulfilled. They are, at their root, an affirmation of unity with one's class, one's culture, one's people. Examples of these rites might include a first communion, a sweet sixteen party, or a bar crawl the night one becomes of legal drinking age. Another example might be that of one's first car. A sacred, almost mythical symbol of freedom to a teenager who did not yet possess one, nothing was more desirable.

Except, maybe, the perfect girl to drive around in one's newly acquired classic Camaro.

But we digress.

In certain places in the nation of Japan, as across the nation of America, a similar rite of passage was generally held to be true. Among the attendees of a certain prestigious educational campus known as "Ouran," it was generally expected that upon one's eighteenth birthday one's parents would give as a gift a suitable mode of transportation. What that mode of transportation was, of course, depended entirely upon one's own tastes, habits, and relationship with whoever controlled the purse strings in one's family.

There were variations in the theme, of course. On the eighteenth birthday of one Morinozuka Takahashi, he had been given a stable of fine horses, sired by prize-winners of several different breeds, and the normally stoic young man had sported for a long time what the careful observer might _almost_ be able to label a smile. His cousin, Haninozuka Mitsukuni, on the other hand, had been given an AS 350 Ecureuil helicopter, broadening his usual grin to near-manic proportions for an entire week while he got used to his new toy. In a more traditional mien, their good friend Ootori Kyouya, vice-president of the Host Club all three were members of, received a satiny black Bentley Continental Flying Spur together with a chauffeur of his own choosing, while the club's president, Tamaki Suoh, went into raptures when he was given an Aston Martin V8 Vantage Roadster in robin's egg blue, the exact shade of his beloved mother's eyes. Their club's most practical (and poorest) member had blinked at the tradition, then simply shrugged, remarking that she didn't see what was wrong with public transportation. Haruhi's eighteenth birthday present from her father had been a set of novels she'd been wanting to read, and a pretty dress.

The club had been shocked, horrified, railed against the suffering that poor people must have to endure, then finally agreed that they _liked_ Haruhi in the dress and it was the prettiest thing ever.

As the eighteenth birthday of the club's two youngest members, the brothers Hitachiin Hikaru and Kaoru, began to approach, they very carefully started slipping hints into conversations with their parents and grandmother as to what they would _really, really_ like for a present. Something that went fast, they'd long since decided. They didn't want to be solid and respectable ("stodgy") like Kyouya-sempai. They wanted something more sporty and eye-catching like Tono's car. Something with a solid roof, though, they decided. Something sleek and fast, dangerous and sexy, eye-catching even among their set. Others could settle for blending in, if they wanted; the twins wanted to stand out.

Saleen S7s, Koenigsegg CCXs, Porsche Carrera GT-4s, Ferrari Enzo Ferraris, Bugatti Veyrons, Lamborghini Murcielagos, and even SSC Ultimate Aero TTs were researched and discussed as possibilities. Whatever model it was, they knew, they wanted two: one for each of them. After all, where would the fun in things be if everyone could tell them apart by what car they drove?

Their mother and grandmother took the twins' subtle hinting calmly, not reacting in any way that would let Hikaru or Kaoru know they'd just found out in advance what their present was going to be. Their father, however, took interest in their research and got into long discussions with them regarding car specs and models. Given that they were both rather fond of their father's Jaguar XK with its gunmetal gray finish, thinking it a sweet machine, and had been allowed to learn to drive using it, they had a high amount of respect (which would have been astounding to their teachers and classmates) for his opinions in the matter. But in the end his half-smiles were just as inscrutable as those of the rest of their family, leaving Hikaru and Kaoru frustrated and chomping at the bit to _find out_ what they were getting.

June sixth dawned bright and fair and (in the brothers' minds) none too soon. For once bounding out of their beds and dressing quickly, before the maids could even rap politely on the door of their bedroom to wake them, they practically raced one another to the dining room, laughing at each other as they almost hit the walls taking corners. After a polite, sedate breakfast during which they were _sure_ their parents and grandmother were deliberately eating slow, making unnecessary small chat, and generally dragging things out just to torment them, their mother turned and smiled at them. "Well, since it _is_ your birthday," she said, "I suppose you may be excused from the table early."

They waited for it.

"Now, dear," their father chided, smiling at his wife, "don't tease. It _is_ their birthday."

"Oh, did we forget to get them presents this year?" their grandmother worried.

"Grandma!" the twins burst out as one.

All three of their family members laughed.

"The front drive," their mother told them.

"'Scuse us," the twins blurted, and took off running again. More laughter trailed after them.

Bursting out the front door of the mansion, the red-haired golden-eyed twins skidded to a halt. Facing them on the drive, neatly parked at right angles to one another, were a pair of Lamborghini Reventons, gleaming in the daylight. One was as gold as the sun, the other as red as blood.

"Holy..." Hikaru said.

"Wow," Kaoru breathed.

As one they reverently approached the immaculate vehicles. Fingertips glided almost hesitantly over satiny paint finishes, caressing the futuristic styling. They tugged the door handles open, Hikaru slipping into the driver's seat of the red car, Kaoru into the yellow one. The seats were perfectly positioned to their height, the buttery leather fitting against their bodies like gloves. Identical eyes wandered wonderingly across the LCD displays, surprisingly gentle hands settling on the grips of the steering wheels.

Absorbed and enchanted, they didn't even notice their parents and grandmother smiling satisfiedly at them from the veranda.

And no one noticed for a long time that the crest scattered across both vehicles-on their hoods, on their tires, on the center of the steering wheel-was subtly changed. In place of the golden Lamborghini bull was instead a golden symbol, lines and angles and planes that converged to form what looked like a face.

An alien one.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> This fic was due largely to fallentaiyoko on LiveJournal posting images of the brand-new, extremely drool-worthy Lamborghini Reventon redone in Sunstreaker and Sideswipe's colors. Hunny's helicopter was a nod to rally driver Colin McRae, who died in a crash the weekend I first posted this.


	2. Chapter 2

The signal had been faint, but distinct. Its contents had been shocking. Their full team, even emotionless Prowl, had looked flabbergasted as Optimus Prime had spoken of the destruction of the AllSpark, and then sent the invitation-the command, given the way Prowl's programming worked-for any surviving Autobots to converge on the small, out-of-the-way planet where the end of the war had been waged. The data packet accompanying the transmission had been de-encrypted quickly, giving more information on the world, the battle, its inhabitants, and the fates of their comrades. Everyone had stilled for a moment when they'd learned of Jazz's sacrifice.

"I-it cannot be true, can it?" Perceptor asked after they'd all had a moment to process the information.

"The AllSpark gone..." Blaster murmured, sounding shocked.

"Jazz," Prowl whispered.

Sunstreaker glanced at his brother, his twin, his sparkmate. Their pilot. "Set course for Earth, Sides," he said quietly.

Three pairs of optics stared at him, shocked. Sunstreaker met their gazes flatly. "Prime wouldn't lie. Without the AllSpark, Cybertron is dead. We might as well check out what this 'Earth' is about while we decide what to do."

**Twin Terrors**  
>by K. Stonham<br>first released 20th September 2007

They'd made good time, Sideswipe decided. The wormhole routes had been with their travel plans and had kindly dumped their ship-the Axalon-out beyond the rings of Earth's sister planet Saturn.

"Locked on to the Ark's signal," Blaster declared within a breem of their triumphant exit. "Looks like Prime parked it in the asteroid ring between the fourth and fifth planets."

"We should follow suit," Prowl decided, stats and schematics flickering across the holo-display before him. "It's an inconspicuous place with enough interference that any Decepticons will have trouble locating either ship without Autobot codes. Additionally, it may cause the planet's inhabitants undue distress if we bring it any closer to Earth."

"Gotcha." Sideswipe set in new destination coordinates and used the planet's gravity well to boost the Axalon's velocity.

The Ark wasn't too hard to find-for anyone who knew Autobot homing frequencies, anyway-and he ended up settling the Axalon into a neat synchronous orbit a few hundred klicks away. "Well, we're here," he informed Prowl. "What now?"

"Blaster, send a message to Prime and the others on Earth that we've arrived and will make planetfall soon," Prowl directed. "In the meantime, let's prepare for departure."

"You mean we have to _clean_?" Sideswipe groaned.

Prowl fixed him with a cold stare. "With luck, we may not be returning to the Axalon for a long time, if ever. If there's anything you wanted to _keep_, Sideswipe, you'll probably want to take it with you."

"Gotta have my tunes, man," Blaster quipped.

"And I will need copies of all the research I downloaded while we were on Gamma-Beta Five," Perceptor agreed. "I haven't had time to fully study the ramifications."

"I'm not leaving my holo tools behind," Sunstreaker declared. "Who even _knows_ if they have decent art supplies on this mudball?"

Prowl raised an optic ridge. Sideswipe just groaned. "Fine, I'll clean up my half of my and Sunny's quarters," he agreed.

"That's all I could hope for," Prowl said dryly.

* * *

><p>There was, in the end, nothing Sideswipe wanted to take with him. All his stuff was just that: <em>stuff<em>. Bits and pieces, dribs and drabs picked up here and there in case any of it might be useful for trading on any of the inhabited planets they'd wandered past. None of it had any meaning for him the way Sunny's art supplies did, or Perceptor's research or Blaster's music or Prowl's... whatever Prowl held important. So in the end he just gathered up all his shiny rocks and chips and arcane bits of local cultures and dropped them all into an empty crate and shut the lid. He had his brother, and that was the only thing on the Axalon that was important to him.

Laying back on his recharge berth while Sunny packed, Sideswipe listened to the hum of the engines. It would be so weird, he thought, not to have them as a constant background noise, lulling him into recharge. And over their soothing background vibration, he heard Perceptor and Blaster walking down the hall to their own quarters. Shamelessly eavesdropping through the open door, Sideswipe wasn't really surprised by the topic of their conversation.

"Blaster," Perceptor started, "about your team-"

"They're comin' with me," the communications officer replied, his voice stubborn, like he either anticipated or had already had an argument on this subject. "Ain't leavin' 'em here all alone, Perceptor." His voice dropped a little. "An' you never know... maybe Ratchet... no offense," he hurriedly tacked on.

"None taken," Perceptor assured him. "And I concur; Ratchet is far more skilled in repairs and restoration than myself. The probability is high that he may be able to fix them."

Their voices stopped just down the hall, probably right outside Perceptor's room. Sideswipe heard the shushing of a door sliding open. "Eh, don't sell yourself short, Perceptor," Blaster replied. "You've kept all of us together for how long now? Even the twins." There was absolutely no blame in his voice for Perceptor being unable to repair his team after Soundwave's pack of Pit-spawned scraplets had practically torn Blaster's own team of minibots apart a vorn ago.

Perceptor chuckled. "I confess, _that_ is a medical duty I shall gladly cede to Ratchet upon our arrival." Sideswipe caught his brother's glance; as one, they both rolled their optics. "Even if it does result in him throwing an arc-welder at my head."

Blaster chuckled. "Man, it'll be good to see 'em all again."

"That it will."

"Catch you on the launch side-make sure you get some recharge instead of researching until then, okay?" Sideswipe heard the soft sound of a friendly pat on the shoulder.

A soft laugh. "I could tell you the same thing, Blaster."

"Well, I'll listen if you will."

Then Perceptor's door slid closed and Blaster walked down to the next one, leaning in Sideswipe and Sunstreaker's doorway. "Don't know if you've heard, but Prowl said be ready to lock up and leave in twelve deca-cycles."

"I'm ready," Sideswipe said. "Just waiting for Goldenrod there to finish packing." That earned him a holo-cube chucked at his head, but he caught it easily.

"We'll be ready," Sunstreaker informed Blaster. "So tell Prowl to stay out of our business until then."

"Man, you still holding a grudge about Alpha-Nine?" Blaster asked. "That was vorns ago, man!"

"And he's still a prick," Sunstreaker replied. "Would it have killed him to wait one single deca-cycle before we had to leave the system?"

Blaster waved his hands disarmingly in front of himself. "Hey, I'm stayin' out of your fight with him. Just be ready to launch, okay?"

"We'll be there," Sideswipe promised for his brother.

"'Night, then," Blaster said, and sauntered down to his own quarters.

* * *

><p>Leaving the Axalon actually went about as scheduled. It wouldn't take that long for them to make planetfall on Earth; Optimus had received Blaster's message and responded with a set of coordinates for them to aim for. The calculations of speed and trajectory were easily made, and after powering down the ship save for its beacon and locking it up so that no Decepticons could get onboard without literally tearing the ship in two, the five of them departed for the planet Prime had declared would be their race's new, final home.<p>

They'd swung past the red fourth planet on their way in and were just approaching Earth's barren moon when Sunstreaker picked up a faint signal.

/Decepticon,/ he transmitted. /Closing in fast./

/Prowl?/ Blaster asked their captain.

/Ignore him. We land./

/Oh slag,/ Sideswipe cursed. /It's Starscream!/

Sunstreaker bit back a curse of his own. Of all the 'Cons to show up-

/The rest of you go ahead to Prime's location,/ Prowl said. /I'll-/

/Slag that,/ Sunstreaker interrupted. /Sides and I aren't letting you face that guy alone. Not after what he did to Bluestreak. Blaster, Perceptor, you two go ahead and let Prime know. We'll catch up./

/But-/ Perceptor protested.

/Do it,/ Sunstreaker ordered, transforming from landing form into something better able to engage the aerospace Seeker. Out of the corner of his optics, he could see his brother and Prowl doing the same. An unaccustomed murderous rage was on Prowl's face. Sunstreaker couldn't blame him. If anyone had done that to _his_ brother... if he'd ever had to _watch_ as Sideswipe was murdered like that...

/One dead Seeker, coming up,/ Sideswipe promised.

And then Starscream was on them.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe shook off the muck of what this planet's rudimentary communications network had informed him was called "Tokyo Bay." "Tokyo" as in the city surrounding it on the shore, and "Bay" as in a coastal inlet of the sea. Sunny?/ he transmitted. /Prowl?/ He didn't even try for Blaster and Perceptor; _they'd_ landed on target, a third of the planet away, and were hopefully with Optimus even now. Sideswipe, meanwhile, had landed on a tiny island nation called "Japan" with his long-distance communications on the fritz from a lucky blow that slagger Starscream had managed to land. At least, he thought with reasonable humor, it was the middle of the night and the native sentients were largely in their recharge cycles. Prime's initial data packet had included the information that this planet hadn't ever had a first contact from outside, and for now, at least on the face of things, the Autobots were working with the planet's governments to keep it that way.

/Great. A _primitive_ backwoods planet,/ Sideswipe thought sourly.

A screeching noise broke him from his musings and he looked up to see a sleek human machine slide gracefully around a corner, rubber tires smoking and leaving black trails on the asphalt. A data packet slid into his mind and he saw, as it passed beneath the lights, that the vehicle was a golden yellow. /Sunny!/

/Took you long enough to finish with your bath,/ his brother retorted, passing him even as Sideswipe finished reconfiguring his alt mode to match his twin's, choosing only to keep the color of his armor the same vibrant red he'd always favored. He raced after his brother down the empty streets and oh how good was it that they'd _finally_ landed on a planet with decent roads He was willing to forgive its inhabitants all their isolated, backwards ways for that alone, the feeling of smooth pavement beneath his tires...

/Where's Prowl?/

/Don't know. He landed around here somewhere, but my comm's out./

/Great. Mine too. So what do we do, bro?/

/We find a place to hide and hang until we can either get ourselves fixed up, or Prowl or Prime turns up looking for us./

/Great. Got any ideas, genius?/

/As a matter of fact, I do./

* * *

><p>And so they ended up kicking back in the morning sun on the driveway of what was apparently a very big estate, compared with the domiciles that Sideswipe had seen on their way to the residence. Sunny.../

/Relax. The inhabitants just bought two of this car model and were expecting them delivered today./

Sideswipe processed that for a moment. /What happened to the original cars?/ he finally asked.

/Nothing,/ his brother said too-innocently.

Just then the front doors of the manse burst open and two young humans raced out, skidding to a wide-eyed halt as they saw Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. Sideswipe recalibrated his sensors in surprise. /They have twins on this planet too?/ he asked.

/It's easier for organics than for us, dumb-aft,/ his brother retorted, and then Sideswipe had to repress a shiver as human fingers glided across his hood. He tuned out his brother's grumbling about human fingerprints on his paintjob as his door was tugged open and then the human-oh!

It was a shocking feeling, to have the weight and warmth of an organic body in him. To have soft squishy hands moving across his interior...

Sideswipe was too stunned to do anything as the human turned a key and his engine roared to life. /Sunny?/ he transmitted in a very quiet tone, guessing from his silence that the sensation was as strange, as _alien_ to his brother as it was to himself.

/Yes?/ his brother asked.

/What the Pit have you gotten us into?/


	3. Chapter 3

**Twin Terrors**  
>by K. Stonham<br>first released 6th November 2007

Haruhi was, in her odd pauper crossdresser way, totally immune to the beauty and glory that was Lamborghini's finest make. Hikaru seemed crushed by this (for three seconds, at least) but Kaoru had rather been expecting it. Haruhi, after all, almost always reacted in a way completely counter to what anyone normal would expect.

Hikaru and Kaoru had quickly decided they loved their cars. Not only were they the sleekest, sexiest wheels in Japan, they drove like dreams, and, even by their jaded standards, the twins had to admit they looked damn good draped across the hoods. Haruhi, of course, just blinked, rolled her eyes, and refused to convert to the Church of Reventon even after Hikaru had taken her for a drive in the red one.

* * *

><p>(The passenger was confusing, Sideswipe decided. The most basic of scans revealed that the human was female, but she wore a male uniform and was addressed as a male by most of the rest of the students. Not so by his and Sunny's pair of twins, though. Was there some arcane organic inheritance law at work that required her to have the social position of a male? Though equal in their theory and philosophy, the two human genders on this planet did seem to have definite assigned roles in their society...)<p>

* * *

><p>It was probably originally Hikaru's suggestion to take "extra" driving lessons, but by the time the twins managed their first successful parallel drifts, Kaoru was so elated that he didn't care. Both of them, however, found it rather annoying when a couple of their idiot male classmates dubbed their cars "Akane" and "Kinki" and declaimed loudly that they were the only girlfriends the brothers could get.<p>

Grinning, Hikaru and Kaoru used their best Tamaki-taught charm and invited the idiots' girlfriends for drives.

They were rather gratified a few days later when they heard both couples had broken up.

* * *

><p>(He and Sides had ended up deciding they liked the twins who were their drivers, or at least found them amusing. For Sunstreaker's part, he found the identical humans not too aesthetically displeasing, and admitted that whoever had initially taught them to drive had done a decent job of it. He'd only had to grab control back once, hitting the brakes when Kaoru hadn't seen an oncoming driver who would have gotten them into a wreck. Hiding was one thing; letting the finish on his paint job get ruined was, in Sunstreaker's opinion, something else entirely. He hadn't missed how the blood had drained from the human's face, but thankfully the "oddness" of the incident seemed to have been quickly forgotten. Though Kaoru had been a little more cautious afterward.)<p>

* * *

><p>Hikaru flung himself out of Akane almost as soon as the car had come to a stop and run over to the driver's side of Kinki. "Kaoru!"<p>

The door was raised, but Kaoru was still strapped in, face drawn and pale. Hikaru threw himself on his twin, frantically patting him down, checking for cuts or bruises. "Kaoru, are you okay?"

His brother was staring at the center of the steering wheel, lips slightly parted. His eyes drifted to meet Hikaru's. "Hikaru..." he said softly.

Hikaru practically hauled his brother out of the vehicle and into the mansion, into their bedroom, wanting to get his other half to a place where he knew Kaoru would be safe, where he wouldn't allow anything to hurt him.

Kaoru didn't go to bed until late that night, though, staying up on the computer, looking at Lamborghini sites.

"Kaoru?" Hikaru sleepily murmured as his twin finally shut off the monitor and crawled beneath the covers.

Kaoru lay still for a moment before murmuring, "I didn't hit the brakes. The car did it without me."

* * *

><p>(He hadn't really expected that human twins would be as close as he and Sideswipe were, but the aftermath of that little almost-accident had proved Sunstreaker wrong. He and Sideswipe hadn't seen the human twins for a whole solar cycle afterward. Sides put even odds on the two of them never being driven again. But the humans proved more resilient than Sideswipe had expected, and Sunstreaker had limited himself to one comment that night on why those kind of logic processes had led to Sideswipe losing every single game he'd ever played against Smokescreen... and Prowl... and himself.<p>

That set off a fight only limited by the size of the garage the servants had parked them in.)

* * *

><p><em>He<em> hadn't braked. Kaoru knew that for a fact. And nothing he'd found _anywhere_ indicated that Lamborghini had started installing anything resembling AIs or passenger safety technology of that degree in any of their vehicles. Not even the top-of-the-line Reventons.

Which, incidentally, came only in the specially formulated Reventon gray/green color. Not in golden yellow or ruby red. He _supposed_ the vehicles could have been repainted before his and Hikaru's birthday, but a casual question to their father ruled that out. They'd come straight from Lamborghini in those colors.

Most damning of all, after spending a full minute staring at the steering wheel in shock, he'd realized that the symbol embossed on it wasn't the Lamborghini bull. And no amount of web-searching turned up anything similar to it.

They _had_ to be Reventons. They were too perfect, too luxurious.

Except they couldn't be.

And in the face of that apparent contradiction, all Kaoru could do was throw himself into research and try to figure out what "Kinki" and "Akane" really were.

* * *

><p>(He's onto us, Sunny,/ Sideswipe warned, noting the way that his brother's twin was slower approaching the golden car than his own twin was.

/Can't be. He can't prove a thing,/ Sunstreaker retorted. /And until he can, we just sit tight./

Sideswipe would have rolled his optics and decked his brother one if they'd been in bipedal form. /And what do we do after he can prove it, genius?/

/Find someplace new to lay low,/ Sunstreaker replied.

If he hadn't been Sunny's twin, Sideswipe would have missed the fact that his brother's transmission was tainted with the faintest note of reluctance. /You /like/ them!/

/Of course I do,/ Sunny retorted. /They're hellions and troublemakers. What's not to like?/)

* * *

><p>It wasn't just the steering wheel. Any place the Lamborghini logo should have been-on the hood, on the wheels, on the <em>headrests<em>... it was that same symbol.

It was classy. Subtle. Discreet.

And decidedly not what was supposed to be there.

He knew Hikaru had realized it too when his brother folded a sheet of notebook paper into a neat origami crane and tossed it at Kaoru across Haruhi's desk. Kaoru unfolded the note, paused at the symbol Hikaru had replicated, then hid it in his textbook, not even looking over at his twin. But he knew Hikaru's eyes were on him, and he nodded subtly. Haruhi, between them, shot suspicious glances back and forth before returning her attention to their teacher.

* * *

><p>(We're screwed,/ Sideswipe said as both human twins now approached them with a healthy amount of caution.

/They still can't prove anything,/ Sunstreaker replied.

/If Prowl finds out-/

/Prowl can go slag himself,/ Sunny retorted. /Fragger hasn't found us after nearly an orn./

Hikaru's fingers traced gently over the Autobot symbol on Sideswipe's steering wheel and he suppressed a shiver. It had been weird enough feeling these organic creatures in them _without_ the humans being conscious of their own touch.

The human's expression suddenly shifted. "You and I," he said, and Sideswipe knew that Hikaru was talking to _him_, not to a mere human car, "are going for a drive."

/We are in such trouble,/ Sideswipe transmitted to his brother. /What did you do with the original cars, Sunny?/

/Warehouse,/ Sunstreaker replied. /We can sub them back overnight./ And then a foot was pressing on Sideswipe's accelerator, and the human-built road raced away under his tires.)

* * *

><p>Kaoru hadn't wanted to talk about it where the cars could overhear them (and that just sounded like sanatorium talk, even to himself) but Hikaru had wanted to take the problem to its source. He'd given in to his brother's idea on the basis that the cars, whatever they were, hadn't hurt them <em>yet<em>... and so he was racing down the expressway, side-by-side with Hikaru's Reventon, the world and other cars blurring past them. Kaoru didn't even look at the speedometer, just ran with it, testing the machine's limits, testing his own.

And when red and blue lights began flashing behind them, he just pressed the pedal down. There wasn't a police car in Japan that could outrace a Reventon.

Or so he'd thought, until the police car chasing them not only kept pace but began to pull closer.

That was when the Reventon jammed its accelerator to the floor, control of the steering wheel slipping from his hands as it _drove itself_.

Kaoru stared at the wheel. "I knew it," he breathed, and risked a look out the passenger window at the red car, where Hikaru met his gaze with a matching expression of terrified, astonished triumph.

* * *

><p>(Oh slag, it's Prowl!/ Sideswipe yelped. /Floor it!/

/The two of you,/ their superior officer promised, /are in such trouble./

/Stuff it, Prowl!/ Sunny snapped, dodging around a slow-moving human vehicle. /Where the slag have you been?/

/Making contacts in the local law enforcement and arranging to contact Prime through native channels,/ Prowl replied flatly. /Ratchet will be arriving shortly, and I'm to escort the two of you to a meeting point./

/Ratchet!/ Sideswipe and Sunstreaker yelped as one, instinctively braking in tandem as they slalomed an exit from the expressway into an abandoned industrial area.

/Oh yes,/ Prowl promised, and there was dark joy in his voice. /I look forward to your repairs at his hands./

/What about First Aid?/ Sideswipe couldn't help whining. First Aid at least was _nice_...

/He's still settling in on the North American continent,/ Prowl remarked, hot on their tails as the twin brothers parallel drifted into an empty warehouse. /Now, quit running away and make your reports!/

/Slaggit,/ Sideswipe muttered to his brother. /Sunny?/

/No better options,/ Sunstreaker replied, his tone irked. /Best to comply./

With an annoyed sigh, Sideswipe opened his driver's door, letting Hikaru stumble out just as Kaoru exited Sunstreaker's cabin. And Prowl was just taking in their passengers now, because he growled in a low, displeased tone, /Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, you have /kidnapped/ humans?/

/Err... not so much, really,/ Sideswipe replied as he and Sunny transformed into bipedal form. /Actually, it's kind of the other way around... kinda funny, that./

/It's a long story,/ Sunny told their superior officer, standing upright even as Prowl himself transformed.

/You have exactly one Earth minute to explain it./)

* * *

><p>The Hitachiin twins, standing side by side, their hands intertwined, stared up at the towering robotic behemoths that chittered back and forth at one another in some sort of electronic language. "Hikaru," Kaoru said slowly, "I don't think we got <em>cars<em> for our birthday..."

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Another stab at "Why is Prowl a Japanese police car?" ^_^ Also, "Akane" is a girl's name in Japan indicating a red color, and "Kinki" I made up to match from the kanji "gold" and "spirit."


	4. Chapter 4

**Twin Terrors**  
>by K. Stonham<br>first released 25th December 2007

Okay, their cars were _not_ Reventons. Hikaru could deal with that. He could even deal with the fact that whatever they were, they turned into giant robots. Which was actually kind of cool, and he wondered who had been developing that technology and _why_ they'd built it into Lamborghinis and _why again_ said Lamborghinis had been given to him and Kaoru. And then there was the cop car robot to consider too, which was nifty in its own Gundam or Patlabor type way, but...

But what he was finding irritating was that all three of the robots seemed to have no problem having a conversation literally over his and Kaoru's heads, totally ignoring the two other people present in the process. Tono would be appalled.

"Hey," he said loudly, his brother's hand held in his. The robots ignored him. He and Kaoru glanced at one another, the same thought going through both their minds.

_Hitachiin twins powers, activate!_

With identical smirks of determination, they looked up at the arguing robots. "HEY!" they yelled together.

All three robots stopped and looked down at them.

"It's not polite to have conversations in front of other people without including them, you know," Hikaru informed them.

"Especially in other languages," Kaoru added. "You _can_ speak Japanese, can't you?"

"Of course we can," "Akane" retorted. "Especially after listening to you two for weeks." "Kinki" elbowed him. "What?" he demanded.

"I apologize for the actions of my insubordinate subordinates," the police-robot told them. "They were out of line to impersonate your vehicles."

"Hey, I'd like to see you come up with a better plan-" the yellow one said before being cut off, the red one elbowing him this time.

Hikaru studied the police-bot for a second. "I'm Hitachiin Hikaru," he introduced himself. "This is my younger twin Kaoru."

The police-bot nodded. "My name is Prowl," he said. "These are Sunstreaker," he said with a gesture at the yellow one, "and Sideswipe," he finished, indicating the red one. "Also twins."

"Twin robots?" Kaoru asked skeptically.

"No weirder than twin humans," Sunstreaker snapped back.

* * *

><p>"Puraoru. Sansutoriika. Saidosuaipu," Hikaru tried the names out. "Those sound English. Do they mean anything?"<p>

/Why English?/ Sunstreaker asked Prowl on a private comm.

/Because it's the international language on this planet, and the one everyone else has chosen to use for their names,/ Prowl answered.

"Urotsuku," Prowl answered the human aloud. A verb, stalking silently in the hunt. "Hisujisha." A noun, one who was an arrow-straight line blazing directly from a sun. "Gawabutsu." A verb, to strike unexpectedly on an exposed flank.

Once, long ago, all their names had been more innocuous things, with more innocent meanings.

That had been a long time ago.

"They will take you to your home and return the original vehicles that were to be delivered to you," Prowl assured the human twins.

The pair of genetically identical teenagers exchanged a glance with each other. As one, they crossed their arms, cocked their heads to opposite sides, and shifted their weight back. It was a deliberately judgemental stance. "Kaoru," one asked the other, "did he just say we would get the other cars back? With a complete lack of giving us any explanation?"

His twin nodded solemnly. "Yes, Hikaru," he replied, "that's what the giant robot said."

The first one snorted. "That's high handed of him, isn't it?" he asked almost rhetorically.

The second human looked critically up at Prowl, eyes assessing his height. "Well," he judged aloud, "he is rather tall. Maybe it's affected his logic?"

Sideswipe badly stifled a chortle of amusement. Prowl glared at him and his brother, then switched his attention back to the _shorter_ pair of twin annoyances. "We are from another planet. There is an interstellar war going on and your world has become a new battleground. Is that satisfactory?" he asked them.

"Not by a long shot," the slightly pushier twin answered him. His gaze drifted to the Autobot twins. "So why hide as our cars?"

"They were just about the only decent vehicles I found in this country," Sunstreaker replied flatly.

"Besides, there was all that lovely waxing and polishing involved with being your cars," Sideswipe added more cheerfully, poking at his brother's gleaming yellow armor.

Sunstreaker growled and swatted his brother's hand away. "Stop it or lose a hand."

"You stayed at our place for the _wax_?" the quieter human asked incredulously.

"How many hair and skin care products do you use?" Sunstreaker sniped back.

"The robots like wax," Kaoru informed his brother. Both human twins looked back up at their counterparts. "Which I bet means they _really_ liked the washing and hand-buffing," he said consideringly.

Sideswipe snorted. "Maybe, but you have no idea how horrible that petroleum fuel your kind uses tastes," he said with a shudder.

"As fascinating as this discussion of mutual grooming habits may be," Prowl broke in, "Ratchet will be waiting for us at the United States military base. I suggest we get moving-unless you want to annoy him?" he asked the Cybertronian twins. They both shook their heads furiously, optics dilated. "Good. Then you will return the humans to their domicile-"

"We're coming with you," Kaoru broke in.

"No, you're not," Prowl disagreed.

"Yes, we are," Kaoru argued. "You said your war is on our planet now, right? You're going to need allies with money and influence in the native population, aren't you? The Hitachiin family has both."

"Kaoru-"

"Trust me, Hikaru," one twin told the other, looking at his brother. By the look in their eyes, a silent communication almost seemed to pass between the two, even though that was impossible for humans given their lack of comm lines. Both mouths curved into identical smiles as they looked back up at Prowl.

"We're coming with you," they said together in a tone that brooked no argument.

An unexpected pang shot through Prowl's core as he remembered-

"Fine," he said shortly. He glanced at Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. /You're still taking them home and returning their vehicles once Ratchet's done with you,/ he sent over the comm, and folded into his alternate shape, indicating the discussion was over. He didn't miss how Sideswipe looked at Sunstreaker and shrugged expressively-apparently they'd been picking up human mannerisms during their time on the planet, which was all to the best-before the both of them folded themselves into the sleek, _expensive_ alternate forms they'd chosen, driver's doors open in invitation to the humans.

With a look at one another, Hikaru and Kaoru Hitachiin walked over to the seeming cars, and got in.

* * *

><p>"So," Hikaru asked, leaning back into the butter-soft leather seat, "what's this?" He tapped an index finger against the face-symbol on the steering wheel that took the place of the Lamborghini bull. The wheel slid under his fingers as Sideswipe turned back onto the freeway. He wasn't even pretending to drive, giving up all semblance of control in favor of talking with the alien who'd been pretending to be his car for the last several weeks.<p>

"One of the faces of Primus," Sideswipe readily answered. "Our god. Some say our creator. It's also the symbol of the Autobots-our side of the war."

* * *

><p>"Thank you for saving my life," Kaoru said quietly to the sentient car.<p>

"That wreck would have ruined my finish," Sunstreaker replied. "Not to mention, the last thing I want to deal with is organic mess all over my interior."

"Most people would say 'you're welcome'," Kaoru pointed out mildly, more amused than offended.

"I'm not most people," Sunstreaker shot back.

"That much," Kaoru said feelingly, "is obvious." He traced a finger along a seam in the leather seat and blinked as Sunstreaker shuddered around him. "I should stop touching you?" he asked.

* * *

><p>"So, that classmate of yours," Sideswipe started. "The girl who dresses like a boy. Why's she do that?"<p>

Hikaru blinked. "Haruhi?" he asked, and of _course_ Sideswipe would know about her-she'd been inside the robot. Car. Alien. Whatever; Hikaru was not going to think about that too closely. "She's a girl, but we didn't know that when she joined our club at school two years back. So the club bought her a guy's uniform, and everyone else thought she was a boy, since she hadn't really interacted with anyone else before." Curiosity struck him. "How could you tell?"

A laugh, and the voice coming through the speakers was distinctly amused. "You think I couldn't tell? She was sitting inside me!"

Hikaru nodded. "Mori-sempai was able to tell just by picking her up, so I guess that makes sense." He glanced out the window, at the police car cruising ahead of them. "Is your superior always such a prick?"

Sideswipe decelerated slightly, and was it Hikaru's imagination or did the vehicle hug the ground just a tad lower. "These days? Yeah."

* * *

><p>Sunstreaker growled just a little. He wasn't about to admit he liked the feeling of the human in him, liked the implicit trust given in the way Kaoru hadn't even hesitated to enter his cabin, knowing what he was. There was no point. He and Sides were only going to be leaving anyway, to rejoin the rest of the contingent on the North American continent. "So," he said, changing the subject, "you're not surprised or scared."<p>

"Should I be?" Kaoru asked.

"Slag yes!" Sunstreaker retorted. "We're bigger than you, stronger than you, certainly better made than you, and you've just gotten told our war is taking place on your planet."

Kaoru shrugged minutely, a ripple against the faux-leather of the seat. "I figured out weeks ago that you weren't a normal car." He turned his head, glancing out the passenger side window at the red car that raced by Sunstreaker's side. "How can robots be twins?"

"It's not too different from the way humans can be," Sunstreaker replied. "Sides and I are one spark, but we took root in two bodies."

"A spark is a... soul?" the human asked slowly, and Sunstreaker compared the word he'd used, _tama_, with its definitions on the human internet. It... actually fit quite well, he thought, for a human concept.

"Close enough," he answered. "What you and your brother pretend to be, my brother and I actually are."

* * *

><p>Listening to the two conversations taking place behind him, Prowl resolutely stamped flat any personal feelings he had about either conversation, and just concentrated on doing his job. On getting them to Ratchet, and then to Optimus. He refused to let himself think further ahead than that.<p>

He couldn't process the thought of the future. That ability had been ripped from him. All that mattered was _now_. All that existed was _now_. If he started to think about the future, about a day past today, then the tightrope he was treading would snap beneath him and he would fall. And from that fall there would be no return.

Before them, at the far end of the paved roads they took, beckoning like a star from far away, Yokosuka Naval Base drew closer.

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> Mad props have to go to TheRhoda for helping me with Hikaru and Kaoru's dialogue and OkamiMyrrhibis for asking for more story.


	5. Chapter 5

**Twin Terrors**  
>by K. Stonham<br>first released 27th January, 2008

His life had gotten decidedly surreal, Sam decided, sometime around the point when he'd gotten a second primary care physician. His new doctor was twenty feet tall, metallic, and came from another planet. For all that, though, he wasn't bad, even if Sam still wasn't as comfortable with the intimate questions and scans as he was with his human doctor's. But then, he'd been seeing Doctor Josef Smith since he was born. Ratchet was... newer. And somehow cooler, even though Sam was appreciating the mundane more now than he had before.

Which did not mean that Sam was not studiously ignoring Ratchet's commentary about his fading cold as he perched cross-legged on top of Bumblebee's hood, flipping through a Japanese phrasebook. Mikaela did the same, save for her seat was higher, atop Ratchet's chartreuse hood, where she was using a bright red laptop to pound out an essay. "Leave the kid be, Ratchet," Sergeant Epps advised from his own seat inside a third vehicle, legs leaning out the passenger door of the dark red Citroen C4 as he slowly sat up inside. Dark sunglasses were pushed back on his shaved scalp and his head bopped slightly in time to the music emanating from the black and gold boom box perched on the roof of the vehicle. "He's got more experience with having colds than you do with curing them."

"Yeah." Mikaela stopped her typing long enough to pat the H2's hood. "Sometimes a cold is just a cold, Ratchet."

"Humph," the alien medic opined. "It could be the precursor to any number of more serious ailments."

Mikaela patted his hood again. "The likelihood of any of which is minuscule," she pointed out.

"Unlikely, but-" Ratchet's arch rebuttal was cut off by Bumblebee's engine revving.

"They've just arrived and passed the security checkpoint," the yellow-armored scout reported. "ETA five minutes."

"Finally," Epps groused. He glanced down at the blue and white DS Lite in his hands. "Gettin' my ass handed to me anyway."

"Rematch?" the game system asked. "Best five outta nine?"

"You're on," said Epps.

* * *

><p>The unlikely convoy moved through the base with the directional familiarity that GPS and the proximity of other Cybertronians lent them. Mikaela watched from where she leaned against the open hangar door as a police car, followed by two Lamborghinis, drove unerringly toward them. "Sweet," said Sam beside her as the police car passed, his gaze on the two sports cars. "Lambos?"<p>

"Murcielagos," Mikaela said with a nod as the red one drove in. Then, "No," she corrected herself, eyes widening, as the yellow one entered. "_Reventons_," she breathed reverently.

"That's special?" Sam, nice and sincere and clueless, asked.

"There're only twenty of them in the world!" she responded, hitting the switch to close the hangar doors. "They cost one-point-eight _million_ each, before taxes!"

"Well," he said, turning to eye the red brake lights of the two vehicles, "I'm guessing there're twenty-two now." He grinned at her. "And they do look like they eat Decepticons for breakfast."

"And here I thought you hadn't met them before," Bumblebee replied before transforming once the doors had fully shut. He looked down at the two of them, one optical ridge raised in an expression of amusement, from his sixteen feet of height as Ratchet likewise transformed.

The doctor looked down at the three vehicles as his body unwound like clockwork, and tapped his foot in an apparently universal shorthand for impatience. "Well, which of the three of you is going to tell me what's wrong?" he demanded.

"Hey, doc, give 'em a break-the dudes just got here," emanated from the speakers of the red C4.

"Hey, long time no see!" said the laptop Mikaela had left on the roof of said vehicle, unfolding into a small robot, one about a head shorter than Frenzy had been though bulkier and better armored.

"Rewind?" one of the cars, Mikaela thought it was the red one, asked, sounding startled.

The game system Sergeant Epps had also set on the vehicle's roof when he'd stood transformed too. As did the boom box. And the Garmin GPS unit inside the car that scuttled out the still-open door and acrobatically leapt up onto the vehicle's roof to be beside its three siblings.

The Japanese police car transformed and stood, optics wide and bright. "You managed to repair them all?" he asked Ratchet, sounding amazed.

"Of course I did," Ratchet replied, sounding mildly offended. "Most of Eject and Steeljaw's mass had to be sacrificed in the name of functionality-" The humanoid game system shrugged lightly and the vaguely leonine GPS shook his head, one unconcerned, the other chagrined. "-but that should be fixable over time. Now," he asked, "what's wrong with your comm systems?"

As the police-bot, whose name Mikaela hadn't caught yet, replied in Cybertronian, a language halfway between a modem screech and a synthesizer's electronic warbles, the driver's-side doors on both the Lamborghinis slowly slid up, and two young men about her and Sam's age stepped out, looking around. They didn't pay much attention to the police car Autobot, but instead gazed wide-eyed at Ratchet, then at the collection of smaller 'bots hanging around the Citroen, then finally looked at Bumblebee, who was watching them back, still radiating amusement.

Mikaela hit him lightly on the armor of his shin. "Knock that off," she instructed, knowing he wouldn't. It was perfectly fine for the Autobots to come to Earth: they had experience dealing with other planets and their natives. The humans they ran into, though, tended to end up with some degree of culture shock before they got used to things. Bumblebee was usually amused at this reaction.

Sam took the initiative, walking over to the two teens-identical twins, Mikaela saw as she followed him and they caught the pair's attention. "Konnichiwa," Sam said with only a little stuffiness left from his cold.

"I think you mean 'konbanwa'," Mikaela corrected. "It's evening."

The twins exchanged a glance, then gave identical smiles as Epps wandered over. "I think our English is better than your Japanese," one said with only the faintest hint of an accent. "My name is Hikaru Hitachiin," he continued, extending a hand toward Sam. "This is my brother Kaoru."

"Sam Witwicky," Sam introduced himself. "This is Mikaela Banes. Tech Sergeant Robert Epps of the U.S. Air Force," he continued as the man himself reached their small human party. "Bumblebee and Ratchet," he added, nodding at each mech as appropriate. Ratchet ignored them in favor of getting more details from the black-and-white-armored 'bot; Bumblebee waved in greeting. "Blaster, with Ramhorn, Rewind, Eject, and Steeljaw," he continued, indicating the Citroen and the array of smaller Autobots sitting atop it, watching in varying degrees of amusement. "Welcome to the circus," Sam concluded.

* * *

><p>By the time Prowl had finished an explanation that spoke of his Academy education with its clean, almost clinical analysis, and his Praxian heritage with his clipped, elegant dialect, the Lamborghini twins had seen fit to introduce themselves to the rest of the humans, and provide a colorful description of who Prowl was as well. Their C.O. finished his statement to the medic and turned to glare at the unrepentant mock-Lamborghinis. Blaster settled back on his wheels, happy to watch, with the welcome weight of his team similar spectators, as the newest round of Prowl-versus-the-melee-twins began.<p>

Then a particular pattern showed up on one of his sensors, and he hastily patched into the base's comms to double-check his findings.

"Slag," he cursed aloud, then raised his voice. "Prowl, Ratchet! We got incoming Seekers. A full trine."

Prowl cut off mid-remonstration as Epps sagged slightly. "Aww, man," he bitched, a human after Blaster's own spark.

"Blaster, contact the human military authorities," Prowl instructed. He looked down at Epps. "Do your kind here have suitable armaments?"

The dark-skinned human snorted. "Whole damn U.S. military got retrofitted since Mission City," he reported. "We're as ready here as anywhere."

"Good." Prowl looked back at Blaster. "Possible identities of the trine?"

"Starscream," Blaster reported with absolute certainty. "I'd recognize that 'bot's accent anywhere. Which means the other two're probably Tweedledee and Tweedledum-yep," he confirmed his first guess as one of the inbound signatures flickered on his sensors, then reappeared elsewhere. "Skywarp and Thundercracker it is."

Prowl's face had gone into a predictable blank rage at the mention of the Decepticon Air Commander. "I'll deal with Starscream," he said flatly. "Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, you're on the other two. Ground them." He started to step forward, toward the hangar doors, but was restrained by Ratchet's sudden hand on his shoulder.

"I don't believe I just heard you correctly," the medic said acidly. "You are not taking on a trine by yourselves." His optics studied Prowl's expression. "What have you not told me?" he demanded softly.

Prowl hesitated just a nanosec, then told the medic flatly "Starscream murdered Bluestreak."

Ratchet's optics widened and his grasp faltered. "That's-"

Prowl shook off the medic's grip. "I will repay him for that," he told Ratchet, then stepped toward the doors once more. The still-vehicular melee twins revved their engines. Sunstreaker paused beside the group of humans to bluntly tell the Japanese twins they'd brought with them, "Stay out of the way," before following Prowl.

Ratchet was still looking shocked by Prowl's disclosure, but shook it off. Maybe he had some idea why Prowl'd survived, Blaster didn't know. "Blaster," the medic instructed, "you and your team cover Prowl and help him with that Primus-slagged 'Con. Bumblebee, you're with Sideswipe. I'll take Sunshine." He looked down at the party of motley humans. "Epps, we'll be in contact. Sam, Mikaela, take care of the two of them." He nodded at the Hitachiin twins, then rapidly folded himself into H2 mode. The yellow Camaro and the red C4, with its crew of four miniature robots inside, followed him and the other three Autobots out the hangar door into the Japanese night, where the roar of three jets was already starting to shake the building and base, American military soldiers running around outside like ants ousted from their nest.

The five humans left behind looked at one another with varying expressions.

"Well," Epps finally asked the Japanese twins, "either of you know how to shoot?"


	6. Chapter 6

**Twin Terrors**  
>by K. Stonham<br>first released 4th January, 2008

Hikaru blinked, thinking absently that the question was just what he should have expected of an American, but Kaoru beat him to an answer. "No," his twin said. "Japan's a pacifist nation. Your country made sure of that, remember?"

A grin of startlingly white teeth in a dark face was his answer. "Never hurts to ask," the military man said good-naturedly. He looked at the two American teenagers. "You two gonna be okay?"

Sam's face was pale but determined as he nodded, pulling a headset out of his pocket, rapidly slipping it into place around one ear. Mikaela wore a similar one, and both pulled out...

Hikaru couldn't help staring. "What are those?"

Mikaela grinned. "The highest tech in human hands on this planet," she replied. What she and Sam each held looked like nothing so much as some kind of ray gun out of a sci-fi show. "Let's just say the Decepticons like us, especially Sam, even less than they like most humans."

Decepticons... Hikaru exchanged a glance with his brother. They'd both gotten a bare-bones outline of the war Earth had suddenly gotten caught up in, and that was the name of the bad side.

Then the hangar exploded, and they found themselves knocked to the ground, sheltered under the bodies of the three Americans.

"Goddamn-" the black man said when the debris had mostly finished falling and they were able to pick their way upright again. Hikaru looked at Kaoru through the smoke and haze, and, wide-eyed, reached for his twin, his other half. His thumb smeared a path of blood from the cut along Kaoru's cheek.

"Epps, go!" Sam shouted. "We'll take care of them."

"Right," the Tech Sergeant agreed. "Stay safe," he instructed before vanishing into the night.

"Come on," Mikaela instructed, hauling Kaoru to his feet with one hand as Sam did the same with Hikaru.

"Stay low," Sam advised. "Move fast and pay attention to your surroundings. Doorways are good."

"L.A.'s earthquake country," Mikaela chimed in. "Amazing how much of that applies to alien attack."

Hikaru gave a feeble grin. "Japan's earthquake country too," he managed as they reached the still-standing remnants of the hangar doors, looking out into the fiery night. His brother's hand was in his and he wasn't ever letting go.

"You're military too?" Kaoru asked.

"No," Mikaela replied. "We're college students. Or will be in a couple months."

"I'll be at USC," Sam said, gesturing a thumb at himself as he intently scanned the tarmac and surrounding buildings. "She's studying at UCLA. We just hang around a lot with the alien robots."

* * *

><p>Seekers, fortunately, were stupid, Sunstreaker thought as he wove around not-quite-panicking humans, picking up speed as he raced toward the approaching trine. As per their usual maneuvers, the three broke up, Starscream plowing down the center, while Thundercracker veered left where Sideswipe was waiting for him. Skywarp angled right and just as Sunstreaker was about to transform, using his momentum to launch himself into the air and <em>down<em> the slagging Seeker, the teleporter vanished, a clap of air rushing in to fill the mass he'd vacated.

"Slaggit!" Sunstreaker swore, even as a wild whoop on his comm lines let him know his twin had nailed a landing on Thundercracker's torso and was madly, merrily, riding the Seeker for all Sides was worth. He screeched to a tires-smoking halt, spinning around to figure out where the 'Con had teleported to.

"I assume you want to know where he went," a too-familiar voice asked archly from behind Sunstreaker. He transformed, turning to look at the medic who had so often in the past been the bane of his and his twin's existence. Wordlessly, Ratchet pointed a single digit upward. "In three seconds. Need a boost?" he asked, just a hint of a smile under the nigh-murderous expression in his optics.

Wordlessly, Sunstreaker nodded and took a running start.

* * *

><p>The shriek that the warping Seeker gave as the melee fighter landed on him, seemingly out of nowhere as he completed a teleport, was gratifying to Ratchet's auditory sensors. He fired a couple of fast blasts at the retreating jet's wings, but could tell by the crash of shattering glass and the screams of rendered metal that Sunstreaker had Skywarp well in hand. He just <em>hoped<em> both of the twins would think to land the Decepticons in uninhabited areas. The American government was going to have a field day explaining this debacle to the Japanese government _without_ civilian casualties being involved.

On the other hand, Ratchet mused briefly, the Japanese, from all the Internet had to say about their culture, might well not have problems with giant (to them) robots from another planet.

He turned to look back in the direction of the base's main area, hearing the sound of human gunfire, hoping it was all being aimed at the right 'bots. Sighing, he left Sunstreaker and Sideswipe to their version of "play" and headed back into the fray.

* * *

><p><em>Oh no you don't,<em> Blaster thought to himself, hot on his C.O.'s bumper as Prowl sped toward the Air Commander who was taking a second pass over the naval base. "Yo, crew, you ready to give the boss-bot some hands?" he asked his passengers.

Steeljaw's growl was echoed in Ramhorn's "Lemme at 'em."

"Taking down a Seeker," Eject said with a glance at his now-larger twin. "Sweet."

"One for the records," Rewind agreed.

"Right, so here's the plan..." Blaster outlined.

* * *

><p>Hikaru wouldn't normally have been embarrassed about screaming like a girl and diving for cover, his twin protected by his arms and by his body. But the American girl, cool and collected and apparently tougher than him, didn't do that. She just knelt and aimed upward, taking steady, pulsing shot after shot of light at the F-22 that shrieked through the air. He could just barely glimpse a host of alien robots of varying sizes on the machine's back before it careened out of control and crashed into the demolished warehouse they'd all just abandoned.<p>

It didn't end there, either, as the plane slid across the tarmac, sparks flying high, slowing until it just nudged a second building and then stopped completely. It shuddered, knocking the quartet of smaller robots off as it tried to transform. Only the biggest, Prowl, managed to cling to its back as the jet gave a feral yowl and managed its shift, blades of metal whirling out and around and forming a new shape, a silver demon with fangs and clawed hands and red-glowing eyes.

Prowl's hand was a silver blade as he hit the Decepticon across the face. The larger robot scoffed and bucked him off, standing like a monster out of a nightmare.

"Sam," Mikaela said lowly, "you stay here. I'll take left."

"No," Sam replied, eyes never leaving the Decepticon, "I will." And with a brush of the back of one hand against Mikaela's cheek-a touch that implied a lot more than either of them had said-he was gone, running off to the left, keeping low and to the shadows where he could.

Mikaela watched him for a second, then switched her gaze back to the two behemoths. "This could get ugly really fast," she said, and Hikaru realized she was addressing them. "Get ready to run."

Then two things happened at once: Prowl and the Decepticon rushed one another, and a red Citroen C4 drove up too fast, and transformed into a blue-eyed robot as it spun out toward the humans.

* * *

><p>"You little dudes okay?" Blaster asked the three humans he was halfway crouched over, protecting them.<p>

"Just peachy," one of the twins' twins bit back. All four of them winced in sympathy as Starscream landed a hit to Prowl that drove him back several yards.

"Shouldn't you be helping him?" the other twin asked.

"Not with this," Blaster answered. "It's one of those honor things. Prowl wouldn't thank me for gettin' in the way, not even if he gets killed."

"Why not?" Mikaela asked, looking up at Blaster, confusion in her eyes.

He smiled sadly at her. "Long story short, our ship, the Axalon, was nicknamed Twins Central. There's Sunny and Sides, o'course, and Eject and Rewind are twins too... but we had one more set of twins." And slag but that still hurt, remembering what they had once been compared to who they were. "Years ago, a couple centuries by your standards, we ended up running into Screamer there and his crew near on the other side of the galaxy. We didn't know they were there until Bluestreak's transmission was cut off. Twins always can communicate with each other, though, so Prowl went after him."

The human twins' eyes were wide. "Prowl... he was a twin?" they asked together.

Blaster nodded. "Starscream had caught Bluestreak. Tortured him for hours, then killed him right in front of Prowl's optics. Bluestreak died in Prowl's arms."

"So that's why he hates Starscream," Mikaela said quietly, still heard over the shriek of rending metal and the groans of gears and thrums of hydraulics pushed past their breaking point.

Blaster nodded. "Jazz was close to both of 'em, so we'd hoped that he might be able to help, but, well..."

"Jazz is dead."

"Yeah."

That wasn't quite all to it, but Blaster didn't go into Prowl's survival and change and questionable sanity as his team began convening on their position. He did, however, duck as half a Seeker's wing ripped through the air over his head and buried itself in the pavement behind him.

* * *

><p>Sideswipe punched the Seeker in the head one more time for good measure. "And STAY down," he said with no small amount of satisfaction, activating his comm lines. They were ominously quiet.<p>

/Where the Pit have you been?/ Ratchet suddenly demanded irritably. /No, never mind that-where are you, Sideswipe, and how damaged are you?/

/Love you too, Ratchet,/ Sideswipe cheerfully replied. /I am just fine, thank you for asking, and beautiful weather we've been having, isn't it?/ Stony silence met his reply. /Thunderchump and I are currently on the southwest face of Mount Fuji. Any chance of getting someone to pick him up? I don't think I can carry him all the way back to Yokosuka all by my lonesome.../

A sigh. /I'll get Sergeant Epps on it. The human retrieval team is currently picking up your brother and the other numbwit Seeker. I'll let you know an ETA as soon as we have one. Maintain position until then./

Sideswipe waited a moment, until he was sure Ratchet had gone back to whatever he had been doing before. /What about Prowl and the winged target?/

He didn't get the growl of irritation he'd expected, instead only a sad, heavy sigh. /They beat the slag out of one another and are both in stasis lock. And I'm only repairing one of them. Optimus gets to decide what to do with the other./

* * *

><p>The human girl claimed to be a mechanic. Sunstreaker nonetheless growled at her as she finished attending to Bumblebee's minor injuries and approached his damaged side. "I am <em>not<em> one of your inferior machines to be tinkered with."

A look entered her eyes that he recognized from having spent too many times at Ratchet's mercy, back on Cybertron. It was one that warned not to test their patience. Before she even said anything, though, Ratchet beat her to it from where he knelt beside Prowl's prone battle-damaged form. "Mikaela, hold up your hand," he instructed.

Blinking, looking bewildered, the human did as instructed.

"You see those fingers?" Ratchet asked Sunstreaker. "Precision instruments," he clipped out. "If you injure her, or even think of injuring her, or even accidentally injure her, _or anyone else I say can work on you_, I will make the Pit seem like the very Matrix itself in comparison." The medic's voice was quiet and soft and contained deathly intent. Sunstreaker felt his optics dilate in shock. Ratchet was _serious_. "Now quit bitching and let her fix you. Otherwise you can just sit there and rust."

Sunstreaker blinked, then looked down at the human, who was looking up at him. "...Fine," he bit out grudgingly.

She gave him a blinding smile. "Don't worry, if I break anything, I'll pay for it," she chirped. Her boyfriend and Bumblebee both snickered. Sunstreaker glared at them as Mikaela went to work, examining the tangle of gears and wires in his left knee that had been damaged, leaving him unable to stand or transform, when he'd crashed Skywarp into an empty human park.

"You're a mechanic too?" Kaoru asked her, wandering up.

"Jack of all trades," Mikaela replied, unslinging a bag from over her shoulder and hunting around in it. She pulled out a pen light, flicking it on as Kaoru looked up, meeting Sunstreaker's gaze. He smiled at Sunstreaker and daringly, confidently, put a hand on thigh armor, leaning against him. Trusting him.

That set up a swirl of conflicting emotion that got cut short as Ratchet dropped an arc-welder with a loud clang, drawing all eyes to him as he stared at Prowl's spark chamber in shock.

"Primus..."

* * *

><p>Sam and Bumblebee crossed the room to Ratchet in a flash. Sam saw nothing at first from his lower vantage, but Bumblebee's optics were dilated in surprise as he stared at Prowl's opened chest. "Bumblebee?" Sam asked. His friend looked down at him, then wordlessly folded his hands together to form a seat. Sam hopped on and was lifted high, against Bumblebee's chest so that he could see...<p>

"Oh," he said softly, stunned. He wasn't the mechanic Mikaela was, but he'd seen inside a spark chamber before when Ratchet had been giving the both of them basic anatomy lessons. Bumblebee's spark chamber, according to the Autobot medic, had looked exactly like one was supposed to.

Inside Prowl's, though, two blue sparks, one slightly smaller than the other, shone with the heat of twin stars.

"Primus, Ratchet," Blaster whispered from where he'd come up behind the medic. "Is that...?"

Ratchet nodded, shock still writ large across his expression. "Somehow Prowl pulled Bluestreak's spark into his own chamber."

"What?" Sunstreaker demanded from where he was seated immobile across the room, Mikaela and one of the twins with him.

"That explains why he ain't been himself since," Blaster said, sounding unsettled. "I mean, he's always been quiet and one for the rules and regs, but nothing like the cold hard-aft he's been since Bluestreak..."

"It explains why he isn't _dead_," Ratchet retorted.

"Dead?" the other human twin asked from near Ratchet's side.

"Twins," Bumblebee explained softly, vibration passing minutely through Sam like a three-point-something earthquake, "don't survive one another."

As though drawn to one another, the Hitachiins' eyes exchanged a glance.

"Ratchet," Sam spoke up. "Is it possible to... I dunno, build a new protoform and transfer the second spark into it?"

Ratchet looked at him. "Possible, yes," he mused. "In theory. Or it might kill them both."

"I can tell you exactly what Prowl'd say to that," Blaster replied.

"So can I," Sunstreaker agreed. All eyes and optics looked to him. "'Do it'," he said succinctly.

"Well, I can't just build it here," Ratchet said. "I need the space at our base in America, and probably some materials from the Ark and Axalon. Prowl-and Bluestreak-will just have to wait until we've picked up Hound and gone home."

The doors to the hangar surprised them all with a sudden rumble as they started opening. A red Lamborghini pulled in first, followed by a military transport vehicle carrying a very wrecked F-22 fighter jet. Sergeant Epps stepped out of the Reventon, grinning broadly. "So," he asked as the car transformed into Sideswipe, who went instantly to check on his twin, "we miss anything?"

* * *

><p>The sky was just beginning to hint at dawn as the two cars pulled into the Hitachiin estate. They stopped before the front door, engines cutting out. But neither opened doors just yet.<p>

"So," Hikaru said. "I guess this is it, huh?"

"Guess so," Sideswipe replied.

"You're off to America, and we're back to school."

"Yeah."

"Think you can stay out of trouble without us around?" Kaoru teased Sunstreaker.

"Think _you_ can?"

A soft snort. "Please, you've met us."

"You know," Hikaru said, "since I'm pretty sure you have our cellphone numbers and e-mail addresses, we could always stay in touch. We could fly over to America and hang out sometime..."

"You just want to hang around with the alien robots," Sideswipe accused.

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

Kaoru let his hand stroke down a seam of the faux-leather seat for the last time, noting how it seemed to warm and ripple under his touch. "Take care of each other," he murmured.

"Don't worry about us. We'll be fine."

"If you ever need anything..." Hikaru offered.

"We won't," Sideswipe replied, and opened his door.

"Time to go?"

"Yeah. We need to book to get your real cars back and get back to Yokosuka in time to head out."

"Catch you around, then. Or not, I guess."

"You know," Kaoru said before getting out of Sunstreaker, "you did say one thing wrong."

"What?"

"When you said that you and your brother actually were what Hikaru and I pretend to be... that's not correct."

"How so?"

Kaoru smiled and leaned forward, whispering to the steering wheel, "You assumed we were pretending." And he got out of the vehicle, his thumb brushing automatically across the Autobot symbol in the center of the wheel.

The twin humans headed to the front steps of their manse and stopped, turning. They watched as the doors to the cars slowly slid shut and the vehicles' engines roared to life. The two high-performance vehicles slowly tooled back down the drive, waiting for the gates to open before them, then turned left onto the road, disappearing from sight behind the high hedges.

"So that's that," Hikaru said softly.

"You think they'll call?"

"No."

Kaoru nodded in agreement.

"But," Hikaru said in addendum, "I did get this." And displayed a piece of paper.

"What is it?" his twin asked.

Hikaru grinned. "Sam and Mikaela's e-mail addresses."

* * *

><p>The servants couldn't quite explain how the young masters' Reventons had changed colors overnight. The twins, though, took it in stride, impressing everyone with their maturity as they didn't try to blame anyone, or even get upset. "This way is probably better," Kaoru said.<p>

"We were getting tired of everyone being able to tell us apart by our cars," Hikaru agreed.

They were slower getting into their cars, though, than they had been before, almost seeming to be checking for something that was missing.

And no one really understood why they referred to the Reventons as "repaints" from that day on. But, then, as their best friend and favorite classmate Haruhi had once said, no one had a chance at understanding their twisted sense of humor anyway.


	7. Chapter 7

It had been months since the encounter that had changed their perception of the universe and their place in it. Over a year, in fact, since the most fantastical, terrifying night of their life.

"Ready, Kaoru?" Hikaru asked, pulling his duffel out of the storage compartment.

"Ready, Hikaru," Kaoru replied, slinging his own bag over one shoulder.

Turning and facing forward, they strode off the plane and into the LAX customs area.

**Twin Terrors**  
>by K. Stonham<br>first released 2nd May 2008

They'd expected to be met at the airport, so finding Sam and Mikaela waiting wasn't a surprise. They both looked more or less the way they had that night at Yokosuka, and didn't even bother holding up a cardboard sign the way so many greeting parties did. Sam's easy grin and Mikaela's bright smile were welcome enough to this county.

"How was the trip?" Mikaela asked. She looked behind them. "No luggage?"

"We shipped it all ahead to the house," Kaoru told her. House, not mansion. Haruhi had taught them both a lot about how to interact with commoners, not that Hikaru had listened as carefully.

Not that Sam and Mikaela were exactly "common."

"The flight was fine," Hikaru told their e-mail pen pals. "How have things been here?"

"Same old, same old," Sam replied with a shrug. "Things've been pretty quiet recently. Thankfully."

"Come on, our ride's at the curb," Mikaela said, and led the way.

The twins grinned as they exited the sliding glass airport doors, breathing deeply for the first time in several hours of fresh, non-recirculated air. Sitting idling at the curb was Sam's car, a sleek yellow Camaro with black racing stripes. They'd seen the vehicle in another form, an alien warrior, and knew that it was definitely more than met the eye.

They didn't expect the two cars that pulled out of the circling traffic and bullied their way into the two spots right behind the Camaro.

Gleaming gold. Shining scarlet.

As one, their breath stopped for a moment, then started again.

"I thought-" Hikaru started.

"They never _wrote_," Kaoru accused.

"You really think we didn't all figure out why you two picked colleges in L.A.?" Mikaela asked.

The drivers' side doors on both Lamborghinis slid invitingly upward.

"Go on," Sam urged. "We'll see you at your place."

Almost unwillingly, the Hitachiin brothers took their first steps back toward their first cars.

* * *

><p>There was a moment of silence after Sunstreaker's door closed before he pulled out into traffic, driving himself. Finally, Kaoru spoke. "I thought you were off on missions, chasing down Decepticons or something."<p>

"We have been," the Autobot replied, taking a right out of the airport and going under the runway. "Bumblebee's humans said you were arriving today, though."

"You could have written."

"Why?" Sunstreaker asked, following the Camaro onto a freeway.

"Because we're..." Kaoru stopped and tried to find the word he wanted. _Nakama_, comrade, wasn't quite the right word. But they weren't _tomodachi_, friends, either. "Because," he finally said weakly, defiantly.

Sunstreaker was quiet for a moment. "Do you know why I hate the 'Cons?" he finally asked.

"No."

The Autobot's voice held barely repressed rage. "I was an artist. Sides was a trader. Then their army swept into our city and made us all slaves. The lucky ones made it into the gladiatorial rings. The rest were smelted for parts." His voice was low and murderous. "_They put a collar on my brother._"

Kaoru was silent. "Hikaru's the only person I would die for. He's also the only person I'd kill for. And I'm never going to tell him that."

Another brief silence. "Maybe you can understand, then," Sunstreaker admitted.

* * *

><p>Hikaru stared out the windshield. "Are all American freeways this wide?" he asked. Seven lanes stretched away before them, either direction.<p>

"Ha! Slag, no," Sideswipe retorted. "Even this one doesn't stay this wide for long. So why CalTech?" he asked abruptly, changing the subject.

"It's one of the best universities in the world for Electrical Engineering, and Kaoru wanted to study fashion at FIDM, and we were _not_ going to end up on opposite sides of the planet," Hikaru answered, leaning back in his seat and looking out at the road that seemed to stretch on forever on either side. He glanced at the dashboard. "I didn't know you were interested in what we were studying," he said levelly.

The alien robot winced. "That was Sunny's idea," he replied. "We really didn't think we'd see you again, and... clean breaks are easier."

Hikaru frowned a little, the reminder of their war and what Sam and Mikaela had hinted at all the Autobots having lost dragging his mood down. "We're kind of hard to get rid of," he pointed out. "I don't know if we'll be any help, but we've been taking shooting lessons for the last year."

Sideswipe was quiet for a minute, then replied almost gently, "Friends aren't just people who help out, you know."

"No," Hikaru replied. "But they're people who want to."

* * *

><p>The keening whoop of a siren startled Kaoru and he sat up straight, glancing by instinct in the mirrors before remembering that he wasn't actually driving. He twisted to look out the Reventon's tiny glass-slatted back window. "Is that...?" he asked hesitantly. It didn't <em>look<em> like the police car that had chased them back in Japan, but that probably didn't matter for Cybertronians.

"Bumblebee, Sunstreaker, Sideswipe," a familiar voice cracked out from the Reventon's speakers with the precision of a whip, "I would expect you to have better sense by now. Do human speed laws mean nothing to you?"

"Yeah," Sunstreaker's voice sounded resignedly from all around Kaoru, "that would be Prowl."

* * *

><p>Behind the black-and-white police car that chased them, a second vehicle of the same model followed, decked out in white and tan colors, but given it was flashing sirens as well, it was doubtless some other law authority. Or alien robot pretending to be one. "Hey, did you get them from the airport okay?" an unfamiliar voice asked via Sideswipe's speakers. "How was their flight? I've never been on a human aircraft-do you think they fly a lot differently than the ones back home? They don't make very good time, but then humans are pretty fragile so I guess they can't travel as fast-"<p>

"Bluestreak," Prowl's voice cut over the stranger's, with just a hint of... what, chagrin? embarrassment? Hikaru didn't know what to call it.

"Sorry, Prowl, I just really really want to meet Sunny and Sides' humans. They sound really interesting and it'd be nice..."

"Is he always like that?" Hikaru muttered almost under his breath.

"You have no idea," Sideswipe replied at the same volume.

* * *

><p>"Sam," Mikaela's voice carried up from the courtyard. Hikaru and Kaoru paused inside the hallway, near a window, listening.<p>

"Yes?" her boyfriend replied.

"I thought your parents' place was nice."

"Mm-hmm," he agreed.

"This place is fraggin' unbelievable." Hikaru and Kaoru exchanged a glance. It was an okay summer home, if a touch small. Well, small by their standards. It _was_ bordered about by tall eucalyptus trees, though, sheltering the property enough that the Autobots had been able to transform once the two of them had given the staff the rest of the day off. The robotic aliens were now lounging about the paved courtyard with their human friends.

"I think she's been picking up Ratchet's vocabulary," Sam's voice said to someone else as Hikaru and Kaoru shrugged at one another and continued toward the outer door.

"I think you're right," Bumblebee agreed.

"Hey, Mikaela," Hikaru called as they reappeared out in the bright California sunshine. One hand toyed with a keychain.

"What?" she called back up to him.

"Catch," Kaoru instructed as his twin tossed the keys into the air. They spun, a glittering silver shuriken that she snatched out of the air and looked at confusedly. They grinned identical Cheshire grins at her. "You're the one going to university across the street," Kaoru continued, gesturing to the east.

"Our home is your home," Hikaru explained, with an open-handed wave that included Sam and all the Autobots as well.

"Our six car garage is your six car garage?" Kaoru asked his brother.

Grinning, "Our wax is your wax!" they concluded together, having confirmed that _that_ shipment had also arrived.

Sideswipe's optics went wide. "You didn't."

They let their smirks be his answer. Bribery, as Kyouya had taught them, worked. Even on people from different planets. They benevolently gestured as one at the garage on one side of the paved courtyard.

Bumblebee turned what could only be described as pleading optics on Sam and Mikaela.

"What's wax?" Bluestreak asked his brother.

With a surprising delicacy and care, Prowl touched Bluestreak's arm, his nigh-omnipresent frown melting away. "You'll like it," he promised gently.

"Five cars, four pairs of hands," Sam calculated out. "This could take a while."

"You got anywhere better to be, LadiesMan?" Mikaela teased.

"Pit, no."

* * *

><p><strong>Author's Note:<strong> I'm an Angeleno (does it show?). Yes, the 405 freeway right at LAX really is seven lanes either direction. The Hitachiin house in LA is in Bel Air (as in, "Fresh Prince of"). This would be because I ended up driving past a bit of it on the way to a summer course I took at UCLA. It really is that freakin' posh. I'm figuring that at this point in the story Bluestreak is still pretty newly rebuilt so he hasn't gotten too much experience of life on Earth. His alt mode (as well as Prowl's at this point) is a Crown Victoria. I figured if Prowl went for traditional police markings Bluestreak could go for Highway Patrol colors... And, no, I didn't bring Jazz back. Unlike Blue, he gets to stay dead.


End file.
